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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28159014">Selkie</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Awesomeist0/pseuds/Awesomeist0'>Awesomeist0</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Oz (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Angst, Canon-Typical Violence, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Heartbreak, M/M, Naked Cuddling, Not Actually Unrequited Love, Possible Character Death, Purple Prose, Touch-Starved, Unrequited Love, Vern Schillinger is not nice, Vern's A+ Parenting, explicit for later chapters, poor sweet baby Andy</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-12-18</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-01-14</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-10 18:06:52</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Explicit</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>3</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>10,195</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28159014</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Awesomeist0/pseuds/Awesomeist0</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Chris shattered Tobias' heart.  Good thing Andy Schillinger can give him a spare.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Tobias Beecher/Andrew Schillinger, Tobias Beecher/Chris Keller</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>7</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>8</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. That night</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>There may be more to this, if there's still any interest in Oz fiction.  Possible spoilers for everything up through season 3 ep 5.  I tagged for purple prose, but this is *really* purple.  With almost obscene amounts of cuddling.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>“Feeling awful again, huh?” Tobias kept his voice as light as the touch he pressed against the teen’s sweaty back.  This was the third night in a row that Andrew had ripped him from the beginnings of a nightmare that he didn’t want to be having anyhow.  And for the third night in a row, he wrung the cleanest washcloth he had under cool water and placed it against the base of Andrew’s neck.  “It’s okay,” he whispered, hardening his heart against the pathetic manchild sobbing between bouts of retching.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“T-talk to me.”  Andrew looked up pathetically from the toilet, dark eyes as huge and docile as a doe’s as green bile glistened up from the center of his bare chest.  “Please, the silence is just-”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Shh.”  Once the teen ceased vomiting. Tobias lightly pulled him back into his arms, leaning against the frame of their bunk as they sat on the bare concrete floor.  “You’re burning up.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“So cold,” Andrew moaned, shifting a little so he was as close to Tobias as possible.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Disgust as thick and noxious as poison flowed through his veins at the first tentative kiss against his pulsepoint.  They had shared tiny moments of affection before, but all had been instigated by Tobias.  Had all been </span>
  <em>
    <span>masterminded</span>
  </em>
  <span> by Tobias.  “You’re not wearing a shirt, sweet boy.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>The broken shell that had once been Andrew Schillinger had already started weeping softly, his warm tears falling against Tobias’ bare arms like rain.  “Too hot with it on.  Fuck, I can’t, it fucking hurts I-”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“</span>
  <em>
    <span>Stop</span>
  </em>
  <span>.”  Tobias pulled away just enough to look into the shaking boy’s face,  Traced his fingertips across apples of cheeks still slightly plush with baby fat.  “I’ll make you a deal.  Come back to</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>//your//</span>
  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“bed so I can clean you up, and I’ll tell you a story.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“But I-”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He pulled off his own t-shirt, throwing it on the floor carelessly and trying not to see himself reflected in the boy’s hugely reflective eyes.  “I promise that I’ll hold you again.”  Tobias skimmed one hand across Andrew’s scrawny chest, hoping he’s twisted his mouth correctly into the beaming smile of loving wonder he could remember seeing on Chris’ face so long ago.  The foolish child actually pinned the hand atop his chest, over the place Tobias could clearly feel his heart beating.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Oh this was going to be too fucking easy.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Your heart feels like it’s about to pop out of your chest.”  He brushed his spread fingertips across as much of Andrew’s bare skin as possible, though the teen’s hand atop his own was like a vice.  “Relax, sweet baby.  Let me take care of you.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He was quick to do just that.  Andrew practically flung himself back into his bunk, whimpering at Tobias so pathetically that it was like every second they weren’t actually touching brought him pain.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“This is one of my daughter’s favorites.”  Tobias took the washcloth from the boy’s neck, running it back under fresh cool water to remove the clinging smell of sweat.  “On the deserted coast of Ireland a long, long time ago, a very lonely fisherman stood on the shoreline, fishing for his daily catch.”  Andrew let out a small gasp that bled into a sob as the cool cloth came back to the side of his neck.  Wiping away the bile.  The tears.  “One day, as the fates would have it, he happened upon a young woman who slept in the hot sun, totally naked.  The fisherman had gone his whole life without ever knowing love, but the very moment he saw her, his heart forgot to beat.”  Once he was satisfied that the teen’s skin would no longer outright sicken him, Tobias chased the path of the slightly scratchy washcloth with his lips.  So softly that Andrew didn’t notice at first, but once he did the quiet sobs of pain ceased abruptly.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Toby.”  His name had become the refrain of a psalm, spoken with a reverence that left him feeling endless.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>A few more kisses, the meandering exploration of clearly untouched skin and Andrew’s answering shudder later, and Tobias let himself speak again.  “But once he saw the sealskin by her side, all of his newfound happiness vanished.  This woman was a selkie, or a mythical creature who could live as a seal, but shed her skin to become human.”  Tobias bit his lip hard at Andrew’s little sigh of absolute contentment when the cool cloth danced across his bare chest.  His sweet, stiffening dark pink nipples and the dark tattoo on his shoulder that matched the mark that had been branded into him so long before.  “His love for her was so intense that in a fit of jealousy he stole her sealskin, hiding it deep in his attic and trapping her on land.”  Tobias kissed his glistening pale skin, feeling a twisted sort of brightness burn within him at the dreamy sigh that answered.  “The selkie married the fisherman, because there was nothing else she could do.  She cleaned his house.  Cooked his meals.  About a year later she bore him a daughter; a beautiful child with eyes the color of the sea.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Like you.”  Andrew’s voice was so breathy and buried beneath the sweetest little sigh that Tobias could pretend not to hear it.  And so he did.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“While the fisherman was out on the ocean one day, his little daughter found the sealskin tucked off in a forgotten corner of the attic.  Having no idea what she found, the girl brought it downstairs to show her mother.”  Andrew Schillinger may as well have been an instrument, he was so fucking easy to play.  Tobias kept his lips against the teen’s bare chest, never touching his nipples but kissing everywhere else.  Watched with manic fascination as Andrew writhed beneath him; cracked lips whispering broken words of devotion he wasn’t stupid enough to let himself believe.  This wasn’t particularly pleasant; Tobias had cleaned him as best he could but he could </span>
  <em>
    <span>smell</span>
  </em>
  <span> the clinging remnants of heroin that cycled through Andrew’s system.  But it was fucking necessary.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>It wasn’t about pleasure, not his or Andrew’s.  Pleasure was everywhere in Oz.  Even in pain.  Intimacy was the real rarity; the one thing everyone yearned for though no one would admit.  It was the one need that could absolutely not be met by force.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Tobias had that once, with Chris.  It had been the shove that sent him hurling down the precipice towards love.  The spark in his soft brown eyes.  Lips brushing against skin, tasting.  Needing.  Not anything as crude as fucking, but with a few passes of skin over skin and a few of the same heartstopping kisses that held Andrew under the same spell, he was done.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Fuck, it was a predictable as the changing of the calendar page.  Even in the near darkness, where evil hid and no one cared and for </span>
  <em>
    <span>months</span>
  </em>
  <span>, all there could be was misery.  Tobias could see Andrew standing on the same ledge he had once been when he gazed into Chris’ eyes.  Wavering and clearly ready to jump, yet skittish.  Unsure.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>//</span>
  <em>
    <span>“let’s push him over the edge.”</span>
  </em>
  <span>//</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“How does it end?” The boy’s voice was barely audible beneath the usual white noise of fighting and fucking.  Of the almost obscene </span>
  <em>
    <span>*smack*</span>
  </em>
  <span> of Tobias’ lips as they pressed and released in the little hollow of Andrew’s breastbone.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He had to chuckle, and he’d hoped the sound would be absorbed back into the void before the boy heard it.  “Do you have a guess?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“She leaves.”  Tobias pressed his mouth into his skin to hide the smirk Andrew should never see.  Because the teen’s voice seemed to shatter with emotion, imploding and cutting his soul deeply as the glass had done to his father so long ago.  In another lifetime.  “Am I right?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Partially.”  He threw the now filthy cloth in the basin, stretching as best he could beside Andrew in the tiny bunk.  Leaning up on his elbow as the needy boy turned towards him, dark eyes so wet and open.  “In the real story, the selkie hightails it out of there before her husband gets home.”  Strong, demanding fingertips fingertips clung to babysoft cheeks that tried to turn away.  Defy him.  Andrew </span>
  <em>
    <span>wants</span>
  </em>
  <span> to hide this moment from him; the moment he actually realizes it’s love that he’s feeling for Tobias.  But Chris wouldn’t let him hide.  Tobias won’t either.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“In the </span>
  <em>
    <span>really</span>
  </em>
  <span> dark version, the fisherman goes mad waiting for his lost love.”  He’s just being cruel for the hell of it now, but there’s a dark beauty in the way Andrew’s tears have started to flow.  Tears of confusion; a soul-shaking attack on the very concept of who he was.  Tears of </span>
  <em>
    <span>need</span>
  </em>
  <span>.  Need for heroin; to silence the gnawing hunger in the core of his bones.  But also a need for gentleness.  Tobias moved his lips to the tight crease in the corner of his eye, tasting the saline and desperation.  And deep down, the absolute love.  “You taste so sweet,” he whispered, savoring each of the </span>
  <em>
    <span>pathetic</span>
  </em>
  <span> sobs that followed as he had once done a fine wine.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“</span>
  <em>
    <span>Toby.</span>
  </em>
  <span>”  There was so much more that lurked within the four letters of his nickname.  So much more that he knew Andrew was only now realizing; he’d been there once and remembered how heartbreakingly freeing it was to have something to hope for.  To actually want to dream of.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“The story, right.”  All of the boy’s tears now gone, Tobias lay his head on the thin pillow beside Andrew’s, lips resting lightly on the shell of his ear.  “Eventually, he just stops eating and sleeping.  All he can do is sit on the shoreline, watching and praying his selkie will return.”  He was </span>
  <em>
    <span>really</span>
  </em>
  <span> laying it on thick now, but it seemed to be filling the jagged cracks in the broken boy’s foundation.  It wasn’t as if any of this was real anyhow.  “At nights, to keep warm, he loses himself in the memory of his skin against hers.  Of the way it felt to be in her arms, so warm and soft and </span>
  <em>
    <span>safe</span>
  </em>
  <span>.”  He punctuated this by giving the peachy helix a few more sweet kisses, one hand skimming up and down his bare chest.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Don’t go, please </span>
  <em>
    <span>please</span>
  </em>
  <span> don’t go-”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Tobias cut off the words he was sure that the boy didn’t want to be speaking with another soft kiss to the ear, but this one went a shade past innocent.  He kissed Andrew over and over again, feeling almost drunk on the taste of the standard issue soap and the addictively sweet taste of his skin.  His innocence.  “Before the next full moon, it simply took too much for the fisherman to keep his heart beating without the touch of his love.  So it stopped.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Andrew was falling now.  That was more than obvious when the teen began sobbing in earnest now, his shaking</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>//branded like him//</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>hands grasping and pawing at Tobias’ skin like a drunk on prom night.  There was love there, he could feel it.  But it was awkward.  Unpredictable.  “I could never tell that version to my kids.  Obviously.”  He stopped the unwanted touching by pinning Andrew against his chest, tangling his fingertips within the dark nest of hair and tracing his fingertips across the blood-warm scalp.  “I Disneyfied it, so the selkie is so overcome with the love for both her husband and daughter that she just throws the skin in the fire.  Remains with them forever, even if it means forever denying who she is.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Could you do it?” Tobias remembered reading an article in the New York Times the morning he brought himself in to begin serving his prison sentence.  Apparently, according to scientists and official government experiments he couldn’t fathom worthy enough to explore, less than one percent of the population had the ability to see millions of shades of colors.  Which seemed like such a pointless thing to be concerned with, now that Cathy Rockwell had died.  But now, he could swear he saw millions of colors.  Millions of </span>
  <em>
    <span>emotions</span>
  </em>
  <span>, all hiding within the paintbox of green and gold that made up the kaleidoscope of the boy’s sad eyes.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Do what?” Ignoring the almost childlike whine of disappointment when he moved his lips from Andrew’s ear, Tobias nuzzled through the boy’s hair to place a series of soft kisses against the hidden partline.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Give up yourself.  Your </span>
  <em>
    <span>skin</span>
  </em>
  <span>, just to keep someone else from breaking?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He answered truthfully, not that Andrew Schillinger was entitled to hear it.  But beneath those endlessly shimmering eyes which were again beginning to mist over with an emotion that both excited and terrified him, Tobias almost felt lost.  “I thought I would, once.  Back when Geneveve was still alive.  Now, I’m not so sure.”  </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I would.”  Andrew spoke with a determination that shook him for the millisecond it took him to bite his own tongue to keep from laughing.  Sloppy but still such sweet kisses</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>//kisses that had no right to fall from the lips of a fucking nazi//</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>charted a rambling course across his bare chest, and the teen’s mouth never left his skin.  Not even when he spoke again.  “I’d give anything.  Everything to stay with you.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He could feel Andrew’s sincerity as tangibly as the warm breath and tear-streaked kisses that covered his chest.  Even still, the confession had been too easy.  Could he actually give voice to the forbidden aura Tobias had been cultivating so carefully? And was he cruel enough to push the boy?</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“My sweet little selkie.”  His words were mocking, but Andrew didn’t seem to notice or care.  “You must be delirious.  Close your eyes.  Try to sleep, if you can.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I’m serious.”  Dark eyes, endless and deep as the universe gazed up at Tobias as if he was the source of all that was good and pure.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Have you ever been in love, Andy?” Speaking the boy’s actual name and not some bullshit term of endearment gave this moment a thickness to it that made it hard for Tobias to breathe.  Didn’t even want to take in the same air in which it hung.  “You’re so young, you probably haven’t.”  He pulled the dark hair a little harder, soothing away the sting that stopped Andrew’s complaint with a kiss.  “It’s not a bad thing; </span>
  <em>
    <span>really</span>
  </em>
  <span> being in love consumes you.”  Tobias moved his face away from his thick nest of hair so Andrew could hear.  </span>
  <em>
    <span>Really.  Hear.  </span>
  </em>
  <span>Every word.  “It changes who you are on the side.  If your love is real, you can feel it flowing through you with each beat of your heart.”  He took a moment to just listen to the broken boy sobbing in his arms.  Andrew chased the breath that fled, much the same way he’s thrown himself head over feet at heroin.  “To be honest, I’ve only felt that way once.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“With Geneveve?” Hearing </span>
  <em>
    <span>her</span>
  </em>
  <span> name, muffled as it may have been fall from that fucking Nazi’s lips, made him immdeiately want to snap the boy’s scrawny neck.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>//“I love you, Toby.”//</span>
  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“No.”  Tobias shook his head gently, hoping Andrew was lost enough in his own head not to notice the waver in his voice.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He hadn’t loved Geneveve in the same, almost primal way as Chris.  He couldn’t.  Chris had been the one to hold him; to put the broken pieces of Humpty Dumpty back together because he sure as shit could not stop throwing himself off of walls.  Chris may have been the cause of his greatest suffering, but Tobias cherished the shiver-soft kiss they shared in the laundry room as his greatest joy.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>//“I never loved you, Toby.  Not even for a second.”//</span>
  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Andrew’s eyes lit up with a wonder that somehow rivaled even the gnawing hunger he had to still be feeling for the heroin.  “Who?” His voice was barely on the edge of composed, face so damn open and offering him </span>
  <em>
    <span>everything</span>
  </em>
  <span>, even if it wasn’t in his power to give.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>There was no fucking way he could talk about Chris, not when he could see the same glow around the boy as clearly as he remembered feeling it so long ago.  Tobias could almost see Andrew clutching his own still beating heart in his hands, so brave and yet so scared as he asked Tobias to keep it safe.  Keep him safe,  “We shouldn’t talk about this now; not until you’re feeling better.”  Ignoring Andrew’s protests, which were as laughably ineffective as the bark of a newborn puppy, Tobias pulled away to grab the scratchy mock wool blanket the teen had thrown off in a fit of anguish.  “There you go.”  He pressed a soft kiss against Andrew’s sweat-slick temple, pulling the blankets up around the boy so that the horrible dark blotch of a tattoo was no longer visible.  “Do you need anything else?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Y-You promised to hold me.”  Tears streamed down Andrew’s face with as much force as the rainstorm that raged outside the courthouse on the day of his sentencing.  </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>He did promise</span>
  </em>
  <span>.  Andrew had cared enough to mention it, and the very fact that he hadn’t already done it had the broken manchild shuddering beneath the industrial washed sheets.  “You’re right.”  Tobias sat back on the bed beside Andrew, one hand resting on his back over the covers.  “You still cold, selkie?” he whispered, certain that he knew the answer as soon as he saw the heat burning in the boy’s eyes.  Andrew just whimpered, head lulling pathetically and eyes just begging Tobias to take him back into his arms.  “Come here.” The instant he slid beneath the sweaty sheets Andrew pounced, nuzzling his bare chest like a sleepy kitten.  “The skin to skin contact should help.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>No one spoke, and the only reason Tobias knew the boy was still awake was the slow, almost rhythmic pattern Andrew traced against his ribs.  “</span>
  <em>
    <span>Stay</span>
  </em>
  <span>.”  The broken sob offered nothing in the way of any real power, but the fact that he attempted to issue Tobias a command had the mercury on the thermometer of his annoyance inching higher.  Even still, he knew he needed to offer Andy safety.  The fact that it was as fictitious as an illusion of smoke and mirrors was of absolutely no consequence.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“As long as you need.”  Tobias tightened his arms as much as he could around the teen, briefly marveling as to how </span>
  <em>
    <span>small</span>
  </em>
  <span> he was.  Had his father not been Vern, Andrew Schillinger would have been absolutely consumed by Oz.  Crushed by it.  “I’m not going to leave you, Andy.”  He felt almost burned by the absolute heat that flushed through each place where their bodies joined.  “You’re safe here.  With me.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Another fucking lie, but one he knew the boy needed to hear.  He had figured that Andrew was none the wiser about it, too sweet and stupid and innocent to comprehend anything.  So the wavering little question caught Tobias completely off guard.  “Do you love me?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>It took longer than Tobias wanted to get his words together, lest he give into his first impulse to laugh in the boy’s face.  Because he didn’t, of course.  Was incapable of it.  Since Chris smashed the brightness within him.  Eviscerated the heart he so naively offered him, which too would be Andrew Schillinger’s fate.  But now wasn’t the time to push him.  Not with the phantom arms of heroin still trying to beckon the boy home.  “You’re lying on my chest, selkie.”  Tobias shuddered in what he genuinely believed to be disgust as Andrew pressed his soft, sweet mouth over and over the curve of his left pec.  “Listen to my heart.”  Moisture fell faster and faster against his skin, and with the teen’s face obscured, Tobias wasn’t sure if it was from tears or saliva.  He </span>
  <em>
    <span>knew</span>
  </em>
  <span> the smile he was making now; the small benevolent one that seemed to be Chris’ secret just for him.  Back in the few short weeks when he was allowed to know happiness.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>But now </span>
  <em>
    <span>he</span>
  </em>
  <span> was in control.  Held Andrew’s heart and sanity and his very fucking life in the balance, and the boy was too blind to see it.  A better man would probably feel guilty.  That man died the very moment Cathy Rockwell did.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Do you hear it?” Tobias was absolutely fucking dragging this exhange out for no other reason than it amused him.  Andrew Schillinger was nothing but a sobbing lump in his arms; a sentient mass of need and desire and something so sweet that Tobias couldn’t help salivating.  Fingers stiff with calluses from weeks of using his cane brushed across such soft skin.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Andrew didn’t speak, but the boy was such a fucking mess it wasn’t exactly surprising.  He nodded against Tobias’ chest, shaking breath escaping like gunshots and searing against his skin.  Consuming it along with the soft flutter of the boy’s own heart which he could only just barely feel, ethereal and fragile as a moth’s wing.  All of these sweet moments, Tobias filed away for later.  Waited to sharpen them like shivs that would later pierce the heart of the broken manchild.  Forever.  He simply lay back, occasionally adding a sweet word or touch to keep the thundering waterfall of comfort Andrew was too eager to provide flowing.  “I love you.”  A broken whisper; one in which Tobias could feel Andrew Schillinger’s heart actually fracturing within his chest.  Barely holding together, like a beautiful vase covered in hairline cracks.  It wouldn’t take more than the slightest pressure for it to shatter.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I know you do, selkie.”  Tobias traced his fingertips up the scrawny</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>//maybe emaciated//</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>flank of Andrew’s body, brushing his fingers over the soft, sweet lips that would not stop whispering words of love.  Rhythmically.  Almost as if the statement had a heartbeat.  There could be no more denying it, to anybody.  Andrew had sworn to give Tobias his skin.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>The first flick of a sweet pink tongue against the pad of his index finger was as curious as a kitten’s, and Tobias couldn’t help a small smile at the teen’s naive boldness.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Soon, he would burn it.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>*</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. The fall</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>“The fuck are you playing at?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Tobias kept his back to </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>//his heart//</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Chris, wincing as the shitty prison toothbrush left bristles between his gums.  “Think you’ve brushed your teeth before.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He snorted, frustration pulsing through him and making him look darker.  On edge.  “I’m talking about your slumber party with sweet baby Andy.”  </span>
  <em>
    <span>Heat</span>
  </em>
  <span>; fingertips or lips or something brushed against the soft curve of his neck.  “O’Reily told me all about it.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Of course he fucking did.”  Tobias spat bitterly into the sink, squaring his shoulders to help burn the unwanted</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>//so, so desperately needed//</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>touch away.  “Andy needed someone.  I was there.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“To </span>
  <em>
    <span>snuggle</span>
  </em>
  <span>?!” The edge in Chris’ voice cut as deeply as the shiv once did his flesh.  “To call him...what was it? Your selkie?!” Strong fingers that could be lethal as knives tangled in the front of his moss green shirt.  “You were supposed to get him to care just enough to prag him out, not get engaged.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Fury, cold and intense as an icy slap to the face had Tobias snapping his eyes up to defiantly meet </span>
  <em>
    <span>his</span>
  </em>
  <span>.  “Was that all Vern wanted you to do to me? Fuck my ass and just brag that I belonged to you now?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“There’s always been more to us Tobe, and you know it.”  A hand shot lightning-quick towards his crotch, fumbling with the button and the awkward angle until Tobias came back to himself long enough to slap it away.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Knock it the fuck off.”  There could have been more violence in retaliation; a split lip or a broken nose or even the same fucking unwanted circumcision he’d given Robson.  Truthfully, the one corner of his heart that had still yet to shatter absolutely </span>
  <em>
    <span>craved</span>
  </em>
  <span> Chris’ touch.  “He should be back any minute.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“From church, right?” Strong, almost violent lips came to brush against his pulsepoint, laying claim to the beat Andrew had wanted so badly for himself the night before.  “Can’t believe you let him go without you.  Big daddy Vern never misses a mass, and sweet Andy is such a fragile thing.  It wouldn’t take much to break him.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Tobias hadn’t even heard the pod door open, so he didn’t realize the boy had returned until he fell upon Chris in a snarling tornado of gangly limbs.  Of pure, unbridled rage and a torrent of ridiculous insults, and even with all of his hatred, Chris was easily able to escape.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Taking care of daddy’s prag, sweet baby Andy?” With a flash of </span>
  <em>
    <span>something</span>
  </em>
  <span> that may have been regret, Chris reached out to caress Tobias’ clothed ass cheek with a tenderness that made him nauseous.  Over the brand; the gift from Vern that had been the catalyst to the most intense</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>//love//</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>pain Tobias had ever felt.  He ripped away with a snarl, tears only pinned in the corners of his eyes when he heard Chris’ heavy bootprints taking the few steps it took to flee the pod.  “Did he hurt you?” Andrew’s eyes were those of captured prey beneath his black knit beanie, so open and skittish and yet trusting.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“No more than usual.”  Tobias felt his spine tense although steel rods had been rammed through it at the first too tentative press of the boy’s hand between his shoulder blades.  It was time for the next part of the plan; the one Andy had set into motion the moment he had been foolish enough to offer his heart to Tobias.  Their magic the night before had been one thing.  Now Andy had to see it could shatter in the daylight like the sweetest dreams in the morning.  “Look selkie, I need you to do something for me.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Anything.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“There’s a lot I need to think about, and I need time to myself to do it.” He caught himself at the last possible second before sliding back into the dream of last night.  And taking Andrew back, almost losing himself as the teen did in the illusion that they could both be safe.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Andrew’s face fell, as his own had done the moment Chris came back from the hole to taunt Tobias about ending their relationship.  “Y-You want me to leave?” Even without the extra cruelty and the alcohol carving his psyche, the boy’s agony was the mirror image to the way his own had been, so long ago.  Questioning why, why has everything he just found but now couldn’t breathe without just been ripped away?</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>It was fucking brutal to see, and had Tobias not been as strong as he was, he would have taken And back into his arms.  Kissed his pain away.  But he was, and the brand that could attest to it began to flare with each of his heartbeats.  “Yes.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>With the amount of tears he shed last night, Tobias didn’t think Andrew’s body was physically able to create any more.  But the poor boy did sob at this; sob as though his poor heart had finally shattered.  And it was only Tobias’ touch that would make him whole.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>But Andrew didn’t </span>
  <em>
    <span>necessarily</span>
  </em>
  <span> need to know if he would ever feel it.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Please, </span>
  <em>
    <span>please</span>
  </em>
  <span> tell me what I did.”  Stunned as he was to hear his own desperate words spoken back to him, Tobias was easily able to wrench his arm away from the boy’s shaky grip.  “I-You’re everything to me.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>An obnoxious </span>
  <em>
    <span>*slam!* </span>
  </em>
  <span>against the side of their pod was the only thing that kept him from kissing the sudden gush of Andrew’s sweet tears away.  “We got a problem here, gentlemen?” The thick Boston drawl percolated through Murphy’s words as he stared at the two, arms crossed over his chest like an annoyed kindergarten teacher.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“No problem.”  Tobias jumped up onto his bunk, making sure to avoid even a single point of contact with the boy.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>The </span>
  <em>
    <span>broken</span>
  </em>
  <span> boy.  </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Schillinger was just leaving.”  He opened his book as if the flimsy paperback could protect him from Andrew’s answering wail.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“That so?” Murphy grasped the teen around his shoulders in a mocking gesture of affection.  Ignoring the pathetic whimper of “Toby” that bounced around the pod for far too long, the CO began to physically walk Andrew towards the now open door.  “Some time with others will do ya good, kiddo.”  Now outside the oasis of safety which once held Tobias and Chris, Murphy let go of the boy with a good natured tossle to the top of his beanie.  “Not good to sulk.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Tobias felt his eyes skimming over and over the same sentence, trying to ignore the look of obvious distrust from the CO.  And the one of brokenhearted misery he could almost feel deep in his chest</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>//“You’re lying on my chest, selkie.  Listen to my heart”//</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>from the boy who had lain there the night before.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>*</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Problem was, although Tobias had all the time he wanted that day for solitude, he didn’t actually want to be alone with his thoughts.  He’d been trying to read his book for more than a week, but each time he grabbed the collection of sci fi stories that seemed vaguely interesting in the library, Andrew would need him.  Not always in ways that he would admit; the boy would find himself snarling up at one of the much larger homeboys the way a poodle would a pitbull, and if Tobias didn’t intervene Andrew would be fucked.  Or the teen would piss off Ryan and Cyril, demanding they supply him more and more heroin and taking the resulting laugh by throwing an awkward punch.  </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>And even fucking now.  Although Tobias had scooched as far back in his bunk as possible, he could feel the constant burn of Andrew’s unwanted eye contact through the glass walls.  The boy had at least been able to dry his tears, and sat at a table with Ryan, Cyril and oddly even Chris; eyes turned towards a football game on one of the television sets but clearly not watching.  Looking so young.  So lost.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Utterly annoyed, he slammed his book shut, rolling on his side to hide from those doe eyes that could not stop asking why.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Tobias actually hadn’t intended on falling asleep in the middle of the day.  But his brain was fried, as taking care of Andrew at nights left him feeling as ragged as when he had a newborn.  Sleeping was a gamble anyway, because he could never tell when he’d dream.  And his dreams had been nothing but absolute nightmares since he killed Cathy Rockwell.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>They couldn’t always feature her, though the setup was always the same.  He’d been drinking.  Heavily.  Even in his dream his eyes felt like cement and he couldn’t keep them open a moment more.  </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He never saw them.  By Christ, each time it happened; each time he rammed his company car into that bright pink bicycle and saw the absolute tortured agony in the eyes as life slowly drained away.  Usually it was Cathy.  Sometimes, himself.  When his subconscious really decided to torture him, it was </span>
  <em>
    <span>Chris</span>
  </em>
  <span> he murdered over and over again.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>But tonight, it was Andrew.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>It was too late.  It always was.  He couldn’t save Andrew because he couldn’t save Cathy.  He was numb behind the wheel from alcohol; only the absolute horror of the situation could burn through his stupor.  The light was almost out of those sweet doe eyes, still so soft and full of love as he gazed at Tobias through the shattered windshield.  “Do you love me now, Toby? I gave you my life, so please hold me.  You promised.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Tobias screamed.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. With every beat of his heart</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>To clarify, Andrew's over 18 here.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Waking up from a nightmare to the sound of his own pathetic shrieking was always disorienting, but with the additional sear of uncertain warmth on his face,</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>//soothing but trying to pull him back to the darkness//</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Breaking the barrier between sleep and alertness was like trying to swim through Jello.  Tobias could still hear the sounds that haunted him; the sickening squeal as his breaks struggled to catch.  The </span>
  <em>
    <span>*crunch!*</span>
  </em>
  <span> as flesh met two tons of metal.  Even the pathetic words of comfort that flowed from Andrew like the blood from his broken skin.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>//“I love you, Toby.  I love you, I love you.  You’re safe.”//</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He managed to force his eyes open with the same wholehearted determination that he’d only had to tap into to get through his detox.  His own broken nights, with only his self hatred and the scratchy blankets for warmth.  The ones Tobias knew he couldn’t forget about, or the siren’s call to use and consume would be too much to ignore.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Andrew was there, and the fact that those sweetly leaking doe eyes were the first thing he really comprehended left Tobias as shaken as if he were still fighting a hangover.  He took a deep breath, guilt constricting sharply as the glow of hope and wonder dimmed away to agony.  To dark eyes that were as red and blown as if he’d used.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Not that Andrew had.  Ryan had been in reluctant agreement to not sell to the boy, although his newfound willpower not to use seemed to be holding strong.  Stronger than Tobias ever was, as his response to Chris’ indifference had been to crawl back into the bottle.  </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“What time is it?” Tobias sat up slowly, which dislodged the hesitant press of a hand on his back he hadn’t realized was even there.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Um, a-a little after ten.  Lights went out just a few minutes ago when you had the nightmare.”  Andrew wiped his leaking eyes on the cuff of one fraying sleeve.  “I’m sorry, I know you don’t want me around.  But you </span>
  <em>
    <span>screamed</span>
  </em>
  <span> and it was awful and-”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“</span>
  <em>
    <span>Hey</span>
  </em>
  <span>.”  Tobias cut him off by taking the boy’s small tattooed hand within his own, just pressing his thumb solidly against the center of Andrew’s palm.  The time had come.  Andrew Schillinger was desperately in love with him; there was absolutely no faking the pain in his absence.  And with his joy in the reunion Tobias could see that Andrew breathed for.  The small *tap* of fabric as Tobias pat the bunk beside him was just as quickly drowned out by Andrew’s gasp of wonder as he scrambled up gracelessly.  Grotesquely angelic face contorted in the oddest half mask of horror and hope.  “I never said I don’t want you.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“But-”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Tobias shook his head gently, thumbing lightly across the deeply cut lines in the teen’s palm.  “I needed to think about you, selkie.”  Fighting the sneer that so badly wanted to curl within his lips, he placed his free hand against the base of the teen’s neck.  Pulled the beanie off of Andrew’s head and pressed their foreheads so sweetly together.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Tobias needed this to be perfect.  After all, this was the very moment Andrew would be dreaming about until he broke.  “You’re all I can think about.”  With their faces so close his words were practically a kiss.  Andrew’s lips quivered as he seemed to be waiting for it, the final press that would join them together.  “Holding you.”  Tobias pressed his mouth to the sweet curve of the boy’s lip, not to kiss him but to soothe the trembling.  “I just dreamed of losing you, and it scares me so fucking much.”  Tobias felt his voice tremble on perfect command and he desperately hoped Chris could hear it.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Andrew fell for it, hook, line, and sinker.  “You won’t.”  He grasped the back of Tobias’ head with a tightness that caught him off guard,</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>//and made him think of Chris//</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>dark eyes offering Tobias promise of a future together he wanted nothing to do with.  But one that it needed to seem he yearned for.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Make sure you know what you’re offering, selkie, before you give it away.”  It would have been too easy to take what Andy freely gave.  To capture the plush lips that quivered so enticingly beside his; to kiss the boy and make him </span>
  <em>
    <span>his</span>
  </em>
  <span> and simply use the willing body.  But every major decision between them had to be made by Andrew.  Or else it wouldn’t have the same effect when Tobias ripped himself away.  “Because if you disappear, my heart will break.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Won’t let you.”  The boy released the hand Tobias had been stroking, pressing it over his chest to feel his heart beating.  “I love you.”  Such a broken whisper, one that shook in time with the delicate little fingertips that touched his chest so lightly.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Tobias’ answer could be no other than the four words that still poisoned his soul.  The ones he could still hear late at night, in the few precious moments before his dreams shifted to nightmares.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>//“I love you, Toby.”//</span>
  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Tobias cupped one of the boy’s sweetly plush cheeks, feeling a dark flash of hunger at his little chirp of surprise.  “Andrew.”  He skimmed his fingers across the bits of jagged peach fuzz Andrew clearly never bothered shaving, feeling so fucking thankful when those sad eyes finally closed.  Gave him a momentary reprieve from having to gaze at this sobbing child with the same intense emotion.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Three.  Two.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I love you.”  Tobias moved his mouth to the empty side of the boy’s face, kissing the pale cheek over and over and wanting to fucking devour him.  Feast on Andrew’s innocence and twist it, leaving him a broken shell. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Based on his emotional day earlier and the fact that they were both running on fumes, he was almost certain Andrew would have simply fallen asleep in his arms in the same lump of boneless contentment that he had for three nights prior.  But with his relief came an apparent surge of adrenaline, and before Tobias could even draw breath, Andrew’s mouth was over his, so hot, demanding, and sweet.  </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He didn’t think the teen had ever been fucking </span>
  <em>
    <span>kissed</span>
  </em>
  <span> before, since Andrew seemed to have absolutely no idea what to do.  He gave too much tongue, flat and slick and alien in its apparent desire to want to actually snake down Tobias’ throat.  Obscure his airway.  Too much fucking </span>
  <em>
    <span>strength</span>
  </em>
  <span>.  He was larger than Andrew, but even with his added bulk the boy was trying to absolutely erode him in a flurry of desperate touches.  “Calm down, selkie,” Tobias chided softly, trying his best to keep the Halloween mask of his soft smile over his utter disgust.  Andrew looked utterly debauched already; plush lips swollen and slick and so sweely blushing even though they’d done nothing more than kiss.  “I’m here.  I’m not going anywhere.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>As he spoke, Tobias couldn’t notice that the tears that Andrew clearly wanted to hide were becoming more obvious.  He could practically smell them in the air like the few sweet moments before the rain fell.  It had grown in him like a cancer from the moment he had talked McManus into switching the boy into his pod.  When he heard Andrew whimpering into his pillow, eyes luminous and so wet, with the sweet tears defiantly stealing away the moisture his body so desperately needed.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Andrew Schillinger was fucking edible when he cried.  And tonight, Tobias would consume him.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Based on the way his lip quivered, it wasn’t going to be long before Tobias got what he needed.  He took charge of the kiss this time, nuzzling Andrew’s cheek and being so gentle.  Too gentle.  The boy moaned against him; the sound merely an appetizer to Tobias that he swallowed greedily.  “How much have you done before?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He felt the boy shake his head beside his own, clearly frustrated that he was being forced to speak and not simply enjoy.  Give voice to his inexperience instead of just waving it away.  “Got a blowjob once.”  Andrew’s voice had a note of boastful pride in it that would have infuriated him, had he been less hungry.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Tobias made a small noise of affirmation, moving his mouth quickly from the one that chased his like a game of tag.  He could feel that Andrew wanted </span>
  <em>
    <span>heat</span>
  </em>
  <span>; pressure and warmth.  The rush of release, but this time.  For the first time.  It would be real and not synthetic.  Which would come, later, but he needed to wield Andrew’s love like a knife.  Kisses soft as caresses brushed across the entirety of that sweet face; those plush cheeks and the tip of that upturned nose and the darkness surrounding them roiled when Tobias felt the fire of a deep blush bloom in the boy’s skin.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Okay, it wasn’t a full blowjob.  She said her jaw hurt about five minutes in.  But it felt really good while it lasted.”  The innocence in his words was almost heartbreaking, considering a half-assed blowjob had been his transformative flashpoint between boy and man.  The one he probably recycled time and time again when he stroked himself off.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>//until recently, the night after Andy moved into his pod.  The boy was starting to respond to the hand that was offered to him in submission.  Offering gentle comfort.  Wordless praise.  Today had been particularly good, because sweet baby Andy actually fell into his naked and freshly showered arms.  Seeking comfort the way a lizard takes heat from a rock.  Consuming.  Giving nothing.  Late that night, when he rolled his eyes and pretended that Andrew’s furious masturbation was making their bunk shudder.  When he listened for those familiar letters of an unfamiliar name on his lips.  One with soft curves and femininity.</span>
  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>(Sara? Mara?)</span>
  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Only to hear those sweetly plush lips catching over the jagged “T” of his own name; the boy’s yearning so so strong that Tobias could actually feel it ensnare him//</span>
  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Until now.  Of course. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Selkie, you are too damn cute to be real.”  He’d expected Andrew’s answering squeak of indignation at being called something so feminine, and even budgeted for his answering annoyance accordingly.  The fact that the boy </span>
  <em>
    <span>didn’t</span>
  </em>
  <span>, however; simply gazed at Tobias with eyes too soft and heart too tangible.  “I don’t know what’s going to happen with us now, or even what you want from me.”  Looking into those achingly innocent eyes; knowing that there was absolutely no way Andrew could comprehend what was happening to him.  It was beautiful.  “I will never </span>
  <em>
    <span>ever</span>
  </em>
  <span> force you to do anything you aren’t one hundred percent okay with.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I know.”  The boy’s desperate words sent the crackling wick of Tobias’ desire smouldering further towards detonation.  Fuck Andrew was </span>
  <em>
    <span>innocent</span>
  </em>
  <span>; too innocent and pure.  Unable to conceive of a situation where Tobias simply took what he wanted from his body, not caring if the boy’s soul shattered.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Oh how he </span>
  <em>
    <span>could</span>
  </em>
  <span>.  Almost yearned for the brutality.  But he knew it would come later.  Cut deeper.  </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I’m not going to fuck you; not while you’re so fragile.”  His own eager lips were quick to claim the sweetest skin of the boy’s neck, not quite able to swallow his answering growl when Andrew sobbed.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>So slutty.  So fucking </span>
  <em>
    <span>pretty</span>
  </em>
  <span> and rippable, along with his soft skin; fragile as well washed cotton.  And his paper heart.  Tobias felt the chains that would someday drag his soul to hell tighten sharply; link after agonizing link ripping into the patchwork muscle of his own heart.  Pulling it tighter; tight enough to feel the imaginary metal scraping against itself at the revelation that Andrew could not understand what he so prettily begged for.  Not just the act of taking a dick up his ass; that he could easily wrap his mind around.  But </span>
  <em>
    <span>wanting</span>
  </em>
  <span> it.  Not caring about who he was before, outside of Oz when he was allowed to live.  Falling so willingly in love with a man when you’d never </span>
  <em>
    <span>ever </span>
  </em>
  <span>felt that way.  Never could.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Until the real world ended.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>From deep within his right arm</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>//the first one that Chris shattered, bringing jagged shards of his bone up and through the skin but that was okay; he couldn’t feel it.  not with the way his heart had been savaged moments before//</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>a familiar but very unwanted pain decided to remind Tobias of its presence, making the very nerves in his bicep convulse in shock.  In </span>
  <em>
    <span>anguish</span>
  </em>
  <span>.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Toby?” The boy’s raw desire turned to concern so quickly that it was like a switch had been flipped in those dark eyes.  “What are you-”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Tobias cut off those fucking innane questions before they could slip past those sweet, plush lips with a hiss of pain.  But mostly annoyance.  “Fucking last gift from your father.  Get me my lotion?” It was a question, in only the barest sense of the word.  Or at least he had intended it to be such.  But sweet baby Andy was quick to snap to attention at the first hint of an order, and though his biceps felt like ropes of steel, Tobias smirked at the </span>
  <em>
    <span>*slap!*</span>
  </em>
  <span> of boots hitting the floor.  </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“What do you need?” He felt Andrew slip beside him again like an unwanted puppy.  “Fuck I can’t believe...I’ll fucking </span>
  <em>
    <span>kill</span>
  </em>
  <span> him for touching-”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Stop.”  Tobias took the bottle from the boy’s shaking hand, feeling both oddly and deeply touched at Andrew’s rage on his behalf.  “It was a lifetime ago.  I promise, selkie, I won’t let him hurt either of us.  Not ever again.”  If he’d been kinder, Tobias would have given the foolish child time to simply bask in the warm glow of safety.  But his</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>//heart//</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>arm was throbbing; an ultrasonic vibration of agony Tobias knew he could do little more than struggle against.  “Put some of the lotion in my other hand, selkie.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“No, lie back.”  The goddamn </span>
  <em>
    <span>defiance</span>
  </em>
  <span> in the boy was only slightly less irritating than the painful electrical storm within his bicep, which was what he had to tell himself to comply.  To allow himself to become wrapped in the gossamer lies of the love Andrew wanted so badly.  Tobias fell flat against his uncomfortable prison issued pillow, hoping that any trace of his real emotions were hidden in the darkness.  Andrew grasped clumsily at his arm the way a disinterested shopper would hunt for the perfect frozen Thanksgiving turkey.  “What hurts?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>After a pause held a few moments into uncomfortably long, Tobias felt his sigh flutter like a flag of surrender.  “My bicep.”  He could hear Dr. Nathan’s lecture about his dependence on his cane playing over and over in his head on a loop.  Of course it made sense that he’d experience residual pain and numbness; that was just par for the course of having all of his extremities shattered.  But by this point in his recovery, as she was fond of saying, he shouldn’t need the cane.  Not daily.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>But Tobias </span>
  <em>
    <span>did</span>
  </em>
  <span>.  Now that the casts had been removed, there was no longer any physical evidence of the abuse he’d suffered.  It was only the cane that kept the sparkle of guilt in the forefront of Chris’ eyes.  And Tobias would never let that go.  It didn’t matter if it made his bicep steel-tight; protesting the constant overwork and driving him to tears.  His pain would always be worth it, if he knew Chris would hurt too.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He closed his eyes in the anticipation of the clumsy touch that he wanted nothing to do with.  “If you could try to get some of these knots out-” The rest of his thought slipped away before he could figure out what he wanted to do with it.    </span>
  <em>
    <span>If</span>
  </em>
  <span> the boy could do that with his borderline violent love it would be a miracle.  And even if he bothered to try it, did Andrew fucking Schillinger have the capacity to offer tenderness? He’d sure as shit clearly never been shown any, unless the half-assed attempt at a blowjob actually counted as something real.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“It’s a little cold.”  There was a touch of a smile in the boy’s words that Tobias couldn’t quite see, but Andrew seemed to be lost enough in his own head not to care that his every word and gesture was being analyzed.  “Tell me if I hurt you.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“You fucking </span>
  <em>
    <span>won’t</span>
  </em>
  <span>.”  It wasn’t even possible; the very thought of Andrew Schillinger ever being more than a cosmic joke to him was enough to send bile crashing in waves over the back of his throat.  He was desperate, but not for </span>
  <em>
    <span>Andy</span>
  </em>
  <span>.  Only what the boy represented.  Salvation and damnation and fuck, if the boy didn’t stop with the indecisive bullshit Tobias would simply rip away the lotion, new claims of love be damned.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>It felt really.  Fucking.  Good.  For a bit.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Andrew clearly couldn’t get past the foolish notion that Tobias was fragile, because there was none of the strength he so needed within those fingertips.  The boy seemed to be content to simply caress his bicep as if it had been made of glass, leaving thick streaks of lotion with every brush of his thumb.  His fingers.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Please.”  Tobias grasped the boy’s tattooed hand so tightly that he could feel each of the fragile </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>//fucking snappable.  head bone’s connected to the neck bone.  neck bone’s connected to the//</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>bones pressing together.  “You won’t break me, I promise.”  He didn’t have to struggle to call the tears of frustrated anguish back to his eyes, and not just because of the muscle spasm.  “It hurts.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Andrew’s mouth was </span>
  <em>
    <span>on</span>
  </em>
  <span> his again; so hot and sweet and Tobias couldn’t help sobbing against it when he finally felt the boy’s fingers digging into his muscle the way he so needed.  It was poisoned by a tenderness he wanted nothing to do with, but when Andy actually lay fully atop him like the princess climbing awkwardly atop a stack of mattresses in the Princess and the Pea, he felt his more complex thoughts begin to sear away.  “Love you.”  Tobias felt Andrew’s desperate words more than he heard them, but nothing either of them would or </span>
  <em>
    <span>could</span>
  </em>
  <span> say would be real.  It was only the heat; sweetness and tears and possibly heaven itself being rubbed into his skin.  “I can’t believe you’re really mine.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>That was quite enough of </span>
  <em>
    <span>*that*</span>
  </em>
  <span>, thank you.  It was difficult enough to come up with the sappy and probably obsessive drivel the boy loved to hear when he </span>
  <em>
    <span>wasn’t</span>
  </em>
  <span> achingly hard, and now Tobias could barely string together a simple sentence, let alone the fucking thesis about his undying love Andew so clearly wanted to analyze.  “Selkie.”  He was sure it sounded more like a snarl than a term of endearment, but speaking the new bullshit pet name that never ceased to make the boy glow bought him time to simply enjoy.  Enjoy that soft skin; those fragile but still strong hands rubbing circles into his bicep clearly as hard as he dared.  Tobias grasped at the boy’s side with the arm that still functioned as intended, unable to stop himself from kissing Andrew so deeply he hissed in pain.  “Sorry,” he whispered, reaching between layers of worn cotton to feel the fragile ladder of the boy’s ribs.  “You’re so fucking sweet I want to consume you.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>The jolt that shot up his spine like a firework at the first uncertain press of Andrew’s covered but still searing dick against his own had him practically leaping bolt upright, and if the boy had been just slightly smaller Tobias would have thrown him to the concrete floor below.  There was still a solidness to Andrew’s fragility; something with hard edges and sharp corners and the duality in him was a maddening contradiction he couldn’t stop pondering.  How could </span>
  <em>
    <span>he</span>
  </em>
  <span> be capable of such love; love he was so careful to keep hidden? This stupid fucking manchild; hiding his love away like it was shameful while purposely carving his hatred into his skin for all to see.  </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“This is okay, right?” Andrew was still gazing down at him with the universe in his eyes, one in which Tobias was so loved and so special and the thought of a </span>
  <em>
    <span>Nazi</span>
  </em>
  <span> feeling that way about him didn’t turn his stomach.  “Your arm?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>It hurt like a bitch, and would as long as he kept the burning flame of desperate love-turned-hate for Chris burning.  “I’m fine.”  To try to add truth to the layers of lies, he reached up to cup Andrew’s sweetly plush cheek; mind flipping through the current Supreme Court Justices to keep the anguish at bay.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>//William Rehnquist.  David Hacket Stouter.  Clarence Thomas//</span>
  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>The friction between them from a few experimental thrusts shouldn’t have been enough to make him feel so </span>
  <em>
    <span>much</span>
  </em>
  <span>, not from so little.  But the littlest crumbs of care thrown his way turned the teen into little more than a begging puppy, desperate and fucking kickable in his desire for love.  He wasn’t quite strong enough to pull the boy’s shirt off, at least not while he was pinned beneath him.   The world around them seemed to tilt a degree with every brush against the boy’s ribs, each moment his fingertips fired the delicious message that he was touching </span>
  <em>
    <span>someone else</span>
  </em>
  <span>.  “I can’t….Selkie, can you help me?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“God yes.”  Andrew pulled back just enough to let Tobias sit, peeling away both the t-shirt and henley beneath it.  The teen’s body was </span>
  <em>
    <span>nothing</span>
  </em>
  <span> like Chris’.  Andrew had a softness that shouldn’t be so very endearing, not here.  There was none of the defined muscles; so solid and warm and offering both love and pain.  Not fucking Andrew Schillinger.  Sleek and smooth, but with a bit of a squish to his practically emaciated frame that betrayed his youth.  He stared at Tobias uncertainly.  </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>//am i good enough tobias?//</span>
  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“You’re perfect.”  He ripped his own shirt away, blushing just a bit at the boy’s answering gasp of shock.  Tobias covered the dark stain on the boy’s shoulder with his hand, not wanting the image of something evil bearing witness to something so sweet.  With his other; the hand that had weakness and thus the one he hated, he resigned himself to unfastening Andrew’s pants.  Brushing the poorly sewn elastic waist down just a bit, skimming his desensitized fingers across the virgin skin just below his belly.  Almost seeing just the slightest glimpse of skin, so hard and full but awkwardly pinned between the boy’s legs to make friction impossible.  God, the stupid fucking moron. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Can you at least suck his dick or something, Andy? Fuck, I’ve never been so bored jerking off.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Chris’ abrasive taunt hit it’s mark perfectly; the fragile soap bubble of safety that could only </span>
  <em>
    <span>barely</span>
  </em>
  <span> keep out reality shattered around them.  Inviting in the shadows and chill and the hypodermic needle-stares of all who watched in judgement.  Andrew just froze like the sweet fawn Tobias knew the child actually was, his heart pounding so fiercely against his chest he actually thought the boy’s ribs would shatter.  </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Hey, how ‘bout you shut the fuck up and leave them alone?” O’Reily’s attempt to intercede was half-hearted at best, as many of the other inmates decided to forgo the early stages of sleep to watch this humiliation.  Which wasn’t humiliating; not fucking for </span>
  <em>
    <span>him</span>
  </em>
  <span>, but if the boy shattered now Tobias wouldn’t ever get what he needed.  And now, he needed Andrew.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Selkie, it’s okay.”  Glaring vaguely up towards the second floor of pods where he </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>//hoped//</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>knew Chris would be watching, Tobias pulled the strings in his expression to twist it back into the one of love the boy needed to see.  “They don’t fucking matter.  No one does but us.”  He wrapped both arms around Andrew’s waist, and the swastika on his shoulder seemed to burn him like the sun.  “Do you still want me?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Tobias wanted words, but the newborn bird’s chirp of “yes” would have to suffice.  The boy struggled more than a grown man should have to remove his own pants and boots, which only further solidified in his mind that Andrew was an absolute fucking disaster.  And that thought made his insides feel oddly warm.  Kisses soft as snowflakes melted against his bare chest as the boy fumbled briefly with his fly; too </span>
  <em>
    <span>too</span>
  </em>
  <span> slowly exposing him to the darkness.  </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>It had been only hours since Chris touched him, even if it had been mocking.  Months before, if not </span>
  <em>
    <span>years</span>
  </em>
  <span> when he’d felt it from someone who genuinely loved him.  Fuck it made no sense, but Tobias could actually feel the boy’s love in every brush of skin against skin.  In the hot press of Andrew’s dick on his thigh; sweetly hard and thick and </span>
  <em>
    <span>fuck</span>
  </em>
  <span>.  Tobias growled low in his throat, tangling their legs together to keep him pinned.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>//and his//</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I need to touch myself.”  The boy’s tears were like a second set of hands against his skin.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“No.”  Tobias kissed Andrew’s cheek over and over again, coaxing the tears to stream faster.  “I’ll touch you, selkie.  If you touch me.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>It sounded so fucking juvinile.  This game of semantics with Andrew that the boy was too oblivious to even appreciate.  Instead of answering with words, he grabbed Tobias with a harsh eagerness that made his heart flutter, even if his cock felt like it was chafing.  God, if </span>
  <em>
    <span>this </span>
  </em>
  <span>was how the boy jerked off, no wonder he was so reliant on opioids to keep him together.  </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Slower, love.”  He wiped a large blob of lotion from his bicep into his palm, warming it a little before tracing his fingertips just over the flared head of Andrew’s dick.  So spongy and blood-warm, pulsing beneath his fingers as if chasing more contact.  “Try to match me.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>//Ruth Bader Ginsburg.  Sandra Day O’Connor//</span>
  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>The idiot </span>
  <em>
    <span>tried</span>
  </em>
  <span> to listen, and although the small hand against him was as demanding as an exasperated gamer with a joystick, the love in Andrew’s touch kept his erection from simply deflating.  God, Andrew wasn’t going to last much longer.  Tobias could almost smell the desire in the air, growing closer and closer with each stroke of his hand.  Andrew’s answering tugs were becoming more and more half-hearted; although he clearly cared about the two of them reaching bliss together, the thunderstorm of his own desire couldn’t be ignored.  </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>His smile was an absolute sneer that Andrew was too blind to see.  “Go on, selkie.”  Tobias tugged at him just a bit faster, fingertips soaking in the memory of the way Andrew shuddered against him.  “I have you, just let go.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Let go</span>
  </em>
  <span>.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>It felt wrong to make this demand of the manchild, even though Andrew was absolutely blooming beneath his touch.  Growing like a flower in a greenhouse; beautiful and trapped but caught so willingly.  Dark eyes unable to contain the love that metastasized within him so it had to overflow.   "Toby."  A desperate whimper, too close to the sickening *crack!* of a dam breaking.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Andrew did something with his darkly stained hand on the root of Tobias' cock that had him straining into the unneeded touch.  Softly sweet but hurtling him towards a nuclear meltdown.  He must have been able to taste the desperate vulnerability in Tobias along with his kiss because Andrew finally seemed to fall into a rhythm that made sense for both of them.  More searing kisses; the consuming pressure of an evening of lies that held Andrew down like the restraints in the hospital.  </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>The clueless idiot came first, clutching Tobias so tightly his own building orgasm was held back.  Which could have been the end of it; after all, he'd won.  Andrew Schillinger was *his*; mind, body and spirit.  Tobias didn't even really want him, not long term anyway.  But with the scent of sex heavy in the air, mixing with Andrew's love like a chemical weapon, he was helpless to fight against him.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>It should have been mortifying.  Finishing pressed so close to Andrew's body that absolutely no one could separate them.  It couldn't even be possible.  Tobias of course felt cold, so cold and sticky and he felt his stomach lurch almost violently when Andrew lay his head back against his chest.  Cuddled close, even though the invitation to do so had not been extended.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>It was over.  The horror movie was on its last reel of film, and now that Andrew had given his virginity willingly, there could be no saving him.  "We should clean up."  He stared down at the stupid boy in his arms, disgust the paralytic agent that kept him from breaking.  "I love you selkie, but you can't sleep here."</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Andrew's slow nod had strands of his disastrous bedhead tickling the center of his chest.  "I know."  Tobias hadn't expected him to still sound so damn sad, not while they were still entwined.  "C-Can I just stay for a little longer?"</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He wanted to say no.  He wanted to tell Andrew to fuck the hell off; his part in this farce was over and it was time for Vern to suffer.  But tonight still belonged to Andrew.  And if he really wanted to waste the little bit of time Tobias allowed him in his life simply cuddling, he'd allow it.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>For a bit longer.</span>
</p>
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